Chapter 710 War's First Wave (I)

I logged out of the game after doing all the stuff I did in the game. It's pretty tiresome to sell stuff too so I rested for a while by sleeping. Despite not being sleepy, relaxing my body and destressing myself like this is the only way for me to actually enjoy it.

When I woke up, I checked up on the elves, Renatta notified me that both of them woke up but she insisted that they sleep back for a while to recover their lost mana and make their body more vibrant. With their hair color being pale green, it's a significant indication that they are running out of mana in their body.

Since they are back asleep after eating breakfast, I went ahead and take my breakfast as well. I also cooked food for everyone this lunch and instructed Renatta to just microwave the food if they are hungry which the former nodded.

After my breakfast, I went back to the game once more. Based on the movement of the monsters, the first wave is almost due today.

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"[Welcome Back, Bladeheart]"

The first thing I did is check on Cotton. As usual, Tina is there guarding the door, reading a book. When she saw me coming, she bowed slightly and put a bookmark on her book before closing it.

"How's the progress of Cotton's evolution?"

"Master. Looks like her evolution is going well but I think I underestimated her growth. Out of the 5 cores that we just put in there, 2 have already lost their color which means it was already used up. The third one is also slowly losing its color as well but it still has some juice left behind."

"You underestimated it? How?"

"From what I can recall, there are some evolutions that happened like this before in the past but since I based it on us insect people's evolution, I assumed it was just 5 cores since that is mostly the usual amount an insect people or insect monsters needed during their evolution but seeing that she is using the cores at an accelerated pace, she is going to need more cores right after the cores are fully absorbed."

"Don't worry about new cores, I still have a few more of them though so why worry?"

"Well, that's good to hear, Master. However, since I said that she is consuming the cores at an accelerated pace, we will need many more. I will deduce that Cotton will consume all of the cores in the next two days. I will tell you later when it is needed to change cores again."

"What about those empty cores? Can they still be used?"

"As far as I know, no. They crumble to dust after they become totally empty and the moment you touch them, it loses their little structure and disappears."

Tina reminded me of various things I needed to do before I left and checked the surroundings outside as I can already hear fighting outside of the cabin. With the cabin being close enough to the nearest hostile zone where monsters gather, I can already tell some players have already engaged in the battle against the enemies.

Checking outside, there are more players around than usual. The others who I have seen before are also looking for party members as well.

"Oh, hey, store owner! Are you going to go on a hunt as well? We are looking for a player to help us with the subjugation. One of our DPS fighters is not online since they are busy in the morning so we are looking for a replacement until she comes back. Wanna join us?" the female paladin from before asked.

I was surprised since she asked me to team up with them. I looked at her party members and it was composed of the necromancer, a cleric, and a samurai. They clearly have a low DPS count indeed if the only DPS they have is the Samurai. The cleric is the support and the necromancer is the semi-debuffer and attacker while the Paladin tanks. It's not a bad combination if they can get things to work.

"Well, I can just go there myself, but where is the fun in that? I needed some stretching as well before I open shop so might as well join you guys. Hope you take care of me then."

The paladin happily nodded and sent me an invite which I immediately accepted. My party members immediately got filled up and I finally know their ign. The female paladin is Lady Flan and she is level 227, the necromancer is Rowdy who is currently sitting on level 213, the cleric is Samsam230 with a level of 210 and the Samurai is Yoshinagi, level 234. I don't recognize their names unfortunately so I don't think I can say much about them.

As for them, the moment my level and name appeared before the team, they couldn't believe their eyes.

"L-LEVEL 300?! Isn't that the level cap?!" the female Paladin couldn't believe her eyes.

"Alright guys, I know you are gawking at my level, but we should go ahead before we lose more enemies to kill, yeah?"

"H-he is right. We should ask that later him, we should go before we are out of enemies to hunt!"

As much as they wanted to ask me questions, the monsters to kill are a priority so they didn't bother to ask.

"Ah, that's right. I should share the quest as well so that you receive the rewards," Lady Flan immediately made me see the questline and as I expected, it was the questline that was given by the queen of the insect people and the mother of Tina.

Without a second thought, I canceled the quest sharing.

"Huh? Why did you cancel it?" Lady Flan couldn't believe her eyes when I canceled the sharing quest.

"Shush, don't worry. I don't need to rob you guys to share the rewards with me. I don't see any worth in it with a level like me so instead of wasting them by sharing it with me, just stick with your initial party members. Besides, the extra experience I gain will just be wasted with a max-level player like me so go ahead and keep it."

Quests that are shared also share the reward with the whole party who has the quest accepted so once the quest is completed, the rewards will be distributed to everyone involved. However, if they have one party member who does not accept the quest while the rest has it, only that party member will not gain any benefits from the quest despite being in the same party, and all the rewards they have will not be shared as well aside from the kills they have done.

But this system is not that useless and it's a very good way for boosting others. Players who need to be boosted accept a quest like killing certain monsters and it nets quite hefty of experience but the enemies are tough to beat by the current players who accepted the quest, that's where the person who didn't accept the quest comes in. Every kill they do, as long as they are part of the kill requirement, despite not being part of the people who accepted the quest, the kill that person did will be counted as a party kill as long as they are part of the party.

"Since you guys are quite good customers yesterday, how about I boost you all up? Having that repeatable quest with you guys should net you guys plenty of experience. Then once you guys are boosted enough, you guys help the DPS who is absent for now reach your current level?"

"R-really? Are you sure you okay with that?"

"Sure, just this once. It's a kind gesture from a senpai, you know?"

"YES! YES, WE WILL ACCEPT!" Lady Flan eagerly accepted.

"Good. Then let's go skin some monsters then. Right, we need to kill some Infected Kobold right?"

I immediately scan the area as quickly as I can and saw the Infected Kobold in the distance, three of them.

[Infected Kobold]

Level: 250

HP: 250,000/250,000

Pretty substandard health. Nothing fancy but considering they are infected, having that much HP is normal. I wanted to move around for a little bit so instead of shooting them in the distance, I pulled out the Versatile Weapon and changed it to a Magic Sword, and charged toward them.

ONE, TWO, THREE swings.

And the Infected Kobold did not get to react before dying and falling to pieces. I didn't even activate any buff or enhancements to my basic attacks so doing only three swings is enough for one.

I grab the other Infected Kobold who noticed me in the neck and gripped it tightly before swinging the monster to the other Infected Kobold who is coming in my way before transforming the Versatile Weapon into a Spear and Shield and throwing it to the two Infected Kobolds, piercing the two in the head, killing them instantly.

The four players who were watching me were all stunned. I went to the corpses and pulled the Versatile Weapon out of the body of the two monsters who immediately shriveled after dying.

"So, what do you say about my fighting style? Pretty messy right?"